The VEISHEA Service Day and Stash the Trash went off without problems despite Saturday’s cold weather.

Many students were there to lend a hand. Together the three groups — Stash the Trash, VEISHEA Service Day and Keep Iowa State Beautiful — successfully exceeded their goal of 1,000 volunteers. The final number was a little over 1,000 with 50 to 75 participants that had not pre-registered.

One of the many volunteers to check in at about 8:30 a.m. Saturday morning was Emily Spicher, sophomore in materials engineering. Spicher was assigned to help out at the First Baptist Church on Lynn Avenue.

“I choose to get involved because this was one of the items for Alpha Phi Omega, the national service fraternity, that we could earn some hours on,” Spicher said.

Another participant, Manisha Gore, student at Ames High School, heard about the event on a volunteering website by Story County, www.1-800-volunteer.org.

“I try to volunteer as much as I can. This, however, is my first service day, but it looks interesting,” Gore said.

“We do a lot of promotions throughout the year,” said BJ Brugman, general co-chair of VEISHEA and junior in agricultural business. “Everything is always on our Facebook or Twitter pages. There are also posters letting students know how to get involved,” Brugman said.

Jennifer Nissen, one of the organizers for Stash the Trash and adviser for VEISHEA Service Day, estimated about 300 residents of the community would show up to take part in cleaning up Ames.

“Stash the Trash was started 11 years ago by the former editor of the Tribune, Dave Kraemer, after a group of committee members decided we needed to keep Ames beautiful,” Nissen said. “Every year we hear from the community thanking us for cleaning up. A few years ago a nursing home resident contacted us saying, ‘Thanks for picking up around this area since we cannot get out and do it ourselves, but we saw people out helping and it was awesome.'”

Jessie Dowding, junior in chemical engineering, decided this would be his first volunteering experience after he received an email from Iowa State informing him about Stash the Trash.

“This is just a good VEISHEA event to volunteer at, and I figured this could be my way to give back,” Dowding said.

Next year the event will be March 24.

“We would love to continue the success of this year with over 1,000 volunteers,” Nissen said. “If I could control the weather, I would ask for a bright sunny day that is about 60 degrees with no wind.”